I am sorry for your loss, Smurf. I also know a young man (who was in my high school class) who got killed by an elderly driver while he was riding his bicycle around some Ivy League campus on the East Coast, a couple of days after starting his PhD in astrophysics. It is maddening. But there are lots of people out there driving who are not paying attention, young and old... and in between.

My dad and his siblings (there used to be 17 of them, now probably 13 or so) have this "deal": they have told each other that they will stop driving when they hit 70 (or is it 75?). That way, nobody has to tell anyone anything: you just stop, no matter how good a driver you think you are. Just in case. I know some of them have passed that milestone already and I don't think they are driving, but I'd need to check. I have a hard time believing my dad will stop driving, but as my mom is six years younger it's likely that he will. Also, my brother and his partner are around to help.

A century of short-sighted urban planning is leaving us with massively sprawled communities that are so entirely car-dependent that it's nearly impossible to really get around if you don't have an engine of your own. A century of medical and public health progress has given us the largest population of elderly people the world has ever seen. We're bound for a catastrophe.

Doctors (and others) are reluctant to take driving privileges away because they know that many elders' health and condition will go downhill from that day, especially because most of them don't have a tight network of people who will help them get around. What a blow to one's autonomy. A catastrophe in every way...